Pretty Woman is back. Julia Roberts, the 1990s megastar who once dominated Hollywood, is returning next month to American movie screens as a leading lady.

In her first starring role for eight years, Roberts will appear in romantic crime thriller Duplicity opposite British actor Clive Owen.

Roberts's return already has many in the film industry licking their lips at the prospect of a comeback for a renowned actress who starred in a string of massive hits in the 1990s. "I have no doubt that her fans will flock to this film in their droves. She still has that killer smile," said Gayl Murphy, a Los Angeles-based celebrity interviewer.

Certainly Hollywood executives are hoping so. Roberts's roles in classic romantic comedies such as Pretty Woman, Notting Hill and Runaway Bride and dramas such as Erin Brockovich made the studios hundreds of millions of dollars, won Roberts an Oscar and turned her into a household name. But, after marrying in 2002, Roberts suddenly confined herself to supporting roles and raising three children. "Julia has always done what Julia wants to do. She is that kind of star and a very, very smart businesswoman," said Murphy.

But now Roberts's time out of the spotlight is over. A steady rollout of publicity over the past week has the nostalgic whiff of Roberts's 1990s heyday about it. The New York Times ran an article on her comeback headlined: "Hello, again". She did a glamorous photo-spread in Allure magazine and news also broke that Roberts is to star in the film adaptation of hit female self-discovery book Eat, Pray, Love

"There is a feeling of 1990s nostalgia in the air. It's no surprise that a star like Julia Roberts is suddenly back again," said Professor Robert Thompson, a popular culture expert at the University of Syracuse.

But the cultural landscape to which Roberts is returning is far different to the relatively happy-go-lucky world of the 1990s. The economic crisis that has gripped America and the world is colouring the sort of films coming out of Hollywood and "America's sweetheart" is adapting to that. Indeed, Duplicity is one of a number of movies that seem to reflect the straitened financial times and a deep well of anger at the big businesses and banks that ordinary Americans blame for triggering the recession.

Roberts's and Owen's characters in Duplicity are corporate spies who team up to steal from their double-dealing bosses. Though clearly a romantic comedy, the portrayal of the corporate world is dark and full of skulduggery. Business figures are shown as rich and ruthless crooks who will stoop to anything to get their way.

Nor is Roberts alone in catching an anti-business zeitgeist that is starting to flow through Hollywood, as America's creative classes adjust to a world facing the greatest economic crisis since the Depression. Another Owen vehicle to be released soon is The International. In that film, the enemy is a powerful bank willing to kill people to get its own way. At one stage, a character remarks: "This is the essence of the banking industry: to make us all slaves to debt." Perhaps it is no wonder the New Republic described it as "suited to the temper of the time". Certainly, multiplex audiences in the US might get satisfaction from seeing a gun-toting Owen bring the bank down.

Michael Moore is also getting in on the act. Last week, he announced that the finance industry is going to be the subject of his next documentary film, following Fahrenheit 9/11, Sicko and Bowling for Columbine. Moore released a public letter appealing for financial industry whistle-blowers to contact him. "Your identity will be protected and you will decide to what extent you wish to participate in telling the greatest crime story ever told," he wrote.

The obsession with hard times has even been shown in the unlikely vehicle of the latest Renée Zellweger movie New in Town. She plays a big-city businesswoman sent to sack people at a small-town factory that is downsizing. The plot is predictable (a handsome union boss is involved), but the subject matter again reflects anxiety about unemployment and big business ethics. Meanwhile, the spectacularly mistimed Confessions of a Shopaholic, starring Isla Fisher, has been panned by reviewers for being so out of touch. "If spendthrift airheads are still your idea of heroines, then enjoy," remarked critic Elizabeth Weitzman in the New York Daily News.

Thompson believes that some form of popular culture examination of the economic crisis is inevitable. But he cautioned against assuming it would all be films about evil rich people and the difficulties of being poor.

"Pop culture is without doubt tapped into the zeigeist, but it is more complex than that," he said. He predicted that some movies could still succeed by celebrating excess as a form of escapism. In that respect, the return of Roberts to the troubled cultural landscape of 2009 is no surprise.

The 1990s now stand out as a decade of peace and prosperity between the cold war and the age of economic collapse. "No wonder we are nostalgic for the 1990s and Julia Roberts. In retrospect, those really were the good times," Thompson said.

Coming soon ...

As the US is gripped by the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, Hollywood is starting to respond.

The International

Starring Clive Owen as an Interpol agent investigating a ruthless international bank, this thriller is a perfect antidote to anti-banker rage. Not only does it show the bank to be murderously evil, but you get to watch Owen pursue it at gunpoint.

Michael Moore's next film

Moore's next project is to investigate Wall Street's role in triggering the crisis.

New in Town

Renée Zellweger's latest rom-com stars her as a corporate hotshot tasked with sacking people at a small-town factory.

Confessions of a Shopaholic

It is possible to see the lightweight Isla Fisher film as a lesson in the dangers of overspending. But critics have mauled it as a disastrously timed celebration of shopping just as Americans are slashing spending to a minimum. Oops!